Session 2 – The 4 Greatest Challenges Leaders Are Facing Today

Fast Action Steps

1. What is your primary goal for managing your time and focus more effectively?
2. If you could create more margin in your life and work, what opportunities would that open for you?

Session Transcript

In the last session, we looked at the overview of this Fast Track and where we’re going to be headed. In this session, I am going to introduce you to the Simple Leadership Compass and look at the 4 Greatest Challenges Leaders Are Facing Today and how to deal with them. As you follow along, here’s the question I want you to consider – where do I need to start?

So, take just a second, download the worksheet for this lesson and then you’ll be able to follow along with us as we move forward.

So again, the question we want to think about is where do I need to start, as we look at the Simple Leadership Compass.

I developed the Simple Leadership Compass based on feedback that we’ve received from hundreds of leaders and teams over the past 20 years. It helps us to understand the 4 Greatest Challenges Leaders Are Facing Today, and here they are.

Nearly every leader that we’ve worked with in the past has told us, I need help in one of four areas:

1. 1. Developing MY OWN leadership skills.
   2. Developing the leadership skills of OTHERS around me.
   3. LEADING FROM THE MIDDLE (often with poor leadership above me).
   4. TIME & FOCUS Challenges.

What we’re helping you to do is identify WHERE you need to start. Let’s look at each of the 4 challenges just a little bit more.

CHALLENGE #1 – Developing MY OWN leadership skills. With this challenge, leaders are often looking for direction around topics like:

• • • How can I sort through the plethora of content and information to identify the perfect tools and resources to develop skills, attitudes, and practices that will stick for me and for my team?
    • How can I apply the content to my setting right away, so training doesn’t become a routine, theoretical experience that is forgotten soon after?
    • I already spend so much time investing in other people, setting aside time to invest in myself is difficult.

We’re going to show you how to invest in yourself without sacrificing your job or home life.

CHALLENGE #2 – Developing the Leadership Skills of OTHER People around me. With this challenge, they often need direction with:

• • • What can I do to better motivate team members?
    • How can I better model great leadership so it is easier for other people around me to emulate?
    • How can I find the right people to invest in?
    • How can I measure the impact of leadership development to show a reasonable return on the investment that I’m making?

CHALLENGE #3 – How can I more effectively LEAD FROM THE MIDDLE, often with poor leadership above me. With this challenge, leaders are often looking for direction around topics like:

• • • How can I communicate more effectively – particularly with a senior leader above me who’s less experienced?
    • How can I succeed or thrive in a low-support, micromanaged environment?
    • What is the best way to help a leader who’s consistently making poor decisions?
    • What can I do when I’m blamed for something that is not even my responsibility?

CHALLENGE #4 – TIME & FOCUS Challenges. With this challenge, leaders are often looking for direction with:

• • • How can I create more margin, so I am not distracted and overwhelmed with busyness?
    • What do I do if I’m consuming so much leadership info, but I don’t have enough time to apply it?
    • How can I do better focusing on the task at hand when I’m working with team members who do not understand their role or commitment level?
    • What do I do when I really just need a crash course for managing my time more effectively?

These are the Four Challenges that we have heard literally hundreds and hundreds of times, over and over from leaders all over the world in all types of market segments. How can I better develop my own leadership skills, how can I better help other people around me develop, how can I lead from the middle even with poor leadership above me, and how can I adequately and effectively address my time and focus challenges?

Based on the information that you provided and the path that you selected, your best place to start is with this fast track.

As you make progress here and complete this Fast Track, and the action steps will help you to identify where your best learning opportunity is next, and where you can achieve the greatest return on your investment.

Along the way the Simple Leadership Compass will provide the easy-to-remember framework for us to refer back to on a regular basis. It helps us to see where we’ve come from and where we’re headed.

Now, I want to take just a second to help you understand how you can maximize your progress, this fast track addresses just one of the four challenges in the Simple Leadership Compass. For that reason, we put together the SIMPLE Leadership Compass Course, the full course, which is named for the tool to help you make progress in every one of these four areas.

When you’re ready, you can use the link below to select the full course which includes the content for all four of the leadership challenges. The link below is going to be available for a limited time to allow you to upgrade to the full course when you’re ready – when you do, we’re going to give you full credit for what you paid for this fast track.

So, when you’re ready, use that link below and you can upgrade your purchase to the full Simple Leadership Compass course that addresses all 4 Leadership Challenges from the Simple Leadership Compass.

The important thing is that you keep making progress and apply what you are learning without being distracted or without losing focus. You are here for a reason. Let’s honor your commitment and keep moving forward.

If you haven’t already, take a moment right now to download the worksheet on this page and complete the action steps for this lesson.

Remember, we’ve designed each session to be easy to complete in just a few minutes each day. It’s important that you apply the learning right now in the right way by completing the action steps on this worksheet. Don’t skip this step. Honor your investment in each session and complete the action steps found in the worksheet.

Next Session

In the next session we are going to move on and begin MODULE 1 – DISCOVER where we talk about Finding the Right Tools for Time Management, Focus, and Planning.

Remember, you don’t have to get it perfect, you just need to take the next step.

So, I’ll see you in the next session.[/text_block]